In this article, I would like to walk you through the IBM Service Delivery Manager (ISDM) upgrade process. Because new functionalities are being introduced with the release of IBM Service Delivery Manager 7.2.2, the ISDM cloud management system becomes an extremely useful and powerful stack to have in your environment. With an upgrade from the IBM Service Delivery Manager 7.2.1 version, you can take advantage of these newly added features . The IBM Service Delivery Manager upgrade can be done in two ways, each upgrading components to different levels.
- Version upgrade: Upgrades the entire IBM Service Delivery Manager software stack from version 7.2.1 to 7.2.2
- Maintenance level upgrade: Upgrades the IBM Service Delivery Manager components to a specific fix-pack level.
In this article, we look at the process of upgrading IBM Service Delivery Manager version 7.2.1 to version 7.2.2, because this is an end-to-end upgrade. First, we need to understand that upgrading IBM Service Delivery Manager is not a one-step upgrade process. It is an elaborate process requiring you to upgrade all four components of IBM Service Delivery Manager: Tivoli Service Automation Manager, Tivoli Usage and Accounting Manager, IBM Tivoli Monitoring, and Network File System (NFS). The upgrade process can take approximately two weeks if all goes positively as expected. The individual product or component upgrade requires running several pre-upgrade steps, followed by the actual upgrade, which consists of installing new components and applying fix packs, and then running the post upgrade steps. To facilitate such an elaborate process, a maintenance tool is also provided to guide you along the way.
The maintenance tool is a software package that helps you with both types of upgrade. This tool aids you in understanding exactly what components your software stack or environment has at any given time. It helps you in understanding the difference between your environment stack and a standard IBM Service Delivery Manager version or fix-pack, thus guiding you through a set of notifications and URLs from where you can run your upgrade. The tool provides an easy-to-use interface, guiding you through a set of steps to help you determine whether or not you need to upgrade your environment, and if needed, to what version or fix-pack level. It also points you to a set of URLs from where you can download the software components required for the upgrade.
Although describing the entire upgrade process in detail is not possible here, we look at the important steps to be carried out while doing an upgrade.
The upgrade process for each virtual image is divided into three steps:
- Pre-upgrade: This step, which prepares your software stack environment to be upgraded, involves meeting prerequisites, increasing disk space and memory, and backing up and configuring your stack.
- Upgrade of software components: This step involves upgrading all the components and subcomponents on individual virtual servers.
- Post upgrade: This step involves running scripts and configuring individual servers before you can finally use the upgraded stack.
List of software components (images) to download
To run the upgrade process, download the following software images:
- Tivoli Service Automation Manager Base V7.2.2 (CI03BML)
- Tivoli Service Request Manager for Service Providers 2.0 (CZPD2ML)
- Tivoli Common Reporting 2.1 (CZQ80ML)
- Tivoli Usage and Accounting Manager Enterprise Edition V7.3.0 for Linux IA32 (CZXZ4ML)
- IBM Tivoli Monitoring 6.2.3
- IBM Tivoli Monitoring V6.2.3 Base Linux (CZZ3DEN)
- IBM Tivoli Monitoring V6.2.3 Agent (CZ5QEN)
- IBM Tivoli Monitoring Performance Analyzer (CZF7XEN)
- Tivoli Provisioning Manager Fix Pack 7.2.0.1 Core and Web Components (7.2.0-TIV-TPM-FP0001)
- Tivoli Provisioning Manager Fix Pack 7.2.0.2 Core and Web Components (7.2.0-TIV-TPM-FP0002)
- Tivoli Provisioning Manager Interim Fix (7.2.0.2-TIV-TPM-IF00001)
- Tivoli Service Automation Manager Fix Pack 4 (7.2.1-TIV-TSAM-FP0004)
- Tivoli Service Request Manager Fix Pack 1 (7.2.0.1-TIV-SRM-FP)
- IBM Tivoli Monitoring 6.2.2 FP 6 (6.2.2-TIV-ITM-FP0006)
- IBM Tivoli Monitoring 6.2.2 FP 4 (6.2.2-TIV-ITM_TMV-Linux-FP0004)
- IBM Tivoli Monitoring Agent 6.2.2 FP04 (6.2.2-TIV-ITM_TMV-Agents-FP0004)
- Tivoli Usage and Accounting Manager 7.3 Fix Pack 1 (7.3.0-TIV-TUAM-FP0001)
- Tivoli Usage and Accounting Manager 7.3 Fix Pack 2 (7.3.0-TIV-TUAM-FP0002)
- IBM Service Delivery Manager upgrade and support (ISDM_for_x86_2of15_V722.tar)
- Tivoli Common Reporting 1.3 (CZ6SXML)
- IBM HTTP Server 7.0 (C1G00ML)
- Tivoli Usage and Accounting Manager 7.3.0 (TUAM_Ent_ed_730_Linux_IA32.tar)
Hardware requirements for individual VMs
As a best practice, if you have memory and space at your disposal in the environment, add sufficient amounts to Tivoli Service Automation Manager because it is the heart of the cloud management system.
Tip: To be on the safe side, add a minimum of approximately 500 MB – 1 GB to the NFS /dev/sdb1 partition. After upgrading, because the system data is going to be used up, NFS should have space to accommodate new data.
To begin, add resources (disk space, memory) from VMware vCenter. You need to shut down the guest VM to add these resources. After adding the resources from the VMware side, you have to start the VM and verify the same from the operating system side.
To add space and increase the swap size, you may consider using utilities such as GParted, or manually create a new partition and mount the contents on the required mount point.
Upgrading Tivoli Service Automation Manager
To upgrade Tivoli Service Automation Manager, you need to apply several fix packs and install the following components:
- Tivoli Provisioning Manager 7.2.0 Fix Pack 1
- Tivoli Service Automation Manager 7.2.1 Fix Pack 4
- Tivoli Service Automation Manager 7.2.2
- Tivoli Service Request Manager for Sevice Providers 7.2
- Tivoli Provisioning Manager 7.2.0 Fix Pack 2
- Tivoli Provisioning Manager Interim Fix
- Tivoli Usage and Accounting Manager 7.3.0 Extensions
- Tivoli Monitoring Agent 6.2.2 Fix Pack 4
- Tivoli Common Reporting 2.1
Upgrading Tivoli Usage and Accounting Manager
To upgrade, you need to apply several fix packs and install the following components:
- Tivoli Common Reporting 2.1
- Tivoli Usage and Accounting Manager 7.3.0
- Tivoli Usage and Accounting Manager 7.3.0 Fix pack 1
- Tivoli Monitoring Agent 6.2.2 Fix Pack 4
Upgrading IBM Tivoli Monitoring
To upgrade, you need to apply several fix packs and install the following components:
- Tivoli Monitoring Server 6.2.2 Fix Pack 4
- Tivoli Monitoring Agent 6.2.2 Fix Pack 4
- IBM HTTP Server 7.0
- Tivoli Common Reporting 1.3
- Tivoli Monitoring Performance Analyzer 6.2.2.2
- Tivoli Monitoring Agent for VMware 6.2.3
Upgrading NFS
Upgrading involves installing only the Tivoli Monitoring Agent Fix Pack.
Best practices
Consider the following best practices:
- Download all the necessary files (images) prior to beginning the upgrade.
- Ask your IT administrator to have sufficient storage available to accommodate multiple point-in-time snapshots of individual servers.
- Stop running projects and workflows in TSAM before starting the upgrade.
- Back up each virtual server (either full system backup or snapshot) before starting the upgrade.
- Edit your server settings to have enough disk space and memory.
- After significant fix-pack upgrades, be sure to take snapshots of the individual servers you are working on.
- Ensure to download the correct version of the maintenance tool. You can obtain this from IBM Fix Central.
References: Special thanks to my IBM colleagues who helped me during my efforts to upgrade ISDM: Ferenc Rada, Aldo Duran, Seema Ahluwalia, and Harish Bhatt.
